Memorandum of Conversation with Secretary of State Dean Acheson, Foreign Secretary of Great Britain Anthony Eden, Mr. Shuckburgh, George Perkins, Philip Jessup, and Homer Byington

TOP SECRET TOP SUCRET SECURITY INFORMATION 139 2 UNITED STATES DELEGATION TO THE 7TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY 310 362 371 November 12, 1952 MEMOR AN DUM OF CONVERSATION The Waldorf New York, N.Y. SUBJECT: European Items raised by Mr. Eden in New York PARTICIPANTS: Mr. Eden, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs DECLASSIFIED Mr. Shuckburgh, Private Secretary to Mr. Éden STATE DEAT. LTR. 5-5-t3 The Secretery of State Mr. Perkins Project NLT +2-4 Mr. Jessup Mr Byingion By NLT- HL NARS, Date 6.20+3 COPIES TO: Mr. Byington Department of State: Mr. Allen Distribution to be Mr. Jessup determined by s/s eDC. Mr. Eden referred to the increasingly difficult situation with regard to Franco-German relations. He mentioned his conversations with both Pleven and Schuman at the time of the denunciation of the EDC by Herriot and Daladier and said that the situation with regard to French ratification was precarious. He said that recently Pleven had informed him that the problem of French rati- fication of the EDC was so great that he had again to urge UK participation Mr. Eden had done his best to discourage any such idea. He said that this was out of the question for the British Government even under some partial form of participation, as for instance contributing a number of divisions, or, as had once been suggested, the participation of British officers. He had pointed to the enormous loss of time, if the whole subject had to be reopened and redis- cussed, and mentioned the alternative the Germans might put forth of German participation in the NATO. Mr. Eden was very concerned over the present drift of the French attitude. They seemed to be weakening in t heir determination regarding the EDC to such an extent that Pleven had lamented that EDC would leave them alone with the Germans, He (Mr. Eden) had replied that there were 50 million French 8.8 well as 50 million Germans; moreover, there were other countries partici- pating in EDC. The Secretary referred to his recent conversations with M. Bech and M. Van Zeeland and the similar preoccupations of both of these Foreign Ministers M. Bech had stressed that the whole situation hung on the single thread of two lives TOP OFORITT SHOURITY INFORMATION TOP SECRET